Topic: Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition

@JaxonH yea, hoping I don't hit a lull in the second half myself. I get your take on side quests, I'm typically the same..i Will say with this game however, that they do make side quests extremely easy compared to other games. You have (!) All over, you have arrows Ponting you in a direction, and the quest log reminding you how much you have left. Not to mention, fast travel makes it a cake walk. I left the mountain range today to make it back to eryth sea and alcamoth (sp?). Nailed like 6 side quests in 5 min since i progressed naturally and got alot of items just by going about my business.

Plus, I'm kinda worried I'll be at the final big bad of the game, and but severely under leveled. It happened with ff7 and ff9 and had to cheese both for the last boss. I'm at level 50 now, and still have a few more side quests in alcamoth. Once im done it's back to the quest. And I should be getting at a decent level at that next juncture.

I put a decent dent in the Eryth Sea area late this morning/early this afternoon. I wrapped up everything in the High Entia Tomb, learned that some of them REALLY dislike Homs, and moved into Chapter 9. I then spent the rest of my session putting a significant dent on many quests in the area.

@Heavyarms55 I did pick up a few more quests today and noticed that many are timed, so I assume that's what you're hinting at. I think I'll pick up the rest of those before moving on to Prison Island. I don't feel as overwhelmed now. XD

Considering everything in the game up to this point seems to be leading up to that floating prison, my JRPG plot sense has been tingling. I suspect something big is about to happen. I feel like I should be prepared lol.

@NintendoByNature That feeling when you stray off the beaten track, find a secret area, and reap in the EXP reward is an awesome one! Everyone is currently at level 44.

@Tyranexx nooooice!! You're creeping up on me. I also have been doing tons of side quests for the EXP

@NintendoByNature I should shove in more playtime tomorrow. I think I'll take a bit of a break and try out Limbo this evening. It's already getting kinda late lol.

@Tyranexx lol yea. Just for giggles I played super blood hockey and a little more shantae. Didn't want to get into another 3 hour session this late.

@Tyranexx It's one of the coolest parts of the game to be sure.

@NintendoByNature Haha, exactly! I called it a night kinda early for a weekend night. I was pretty tired lol. Crazy day yesterday.

@Heavyarms55 Coolest eh? I'll make a note to equip them all with cold weather equipment.

Thinking about Smash, have any of you managed to get a party of Shulk, Dunban and Riki to work?

I just stick with Shulk, Reyn and Sharla. Every time I try to use a different team, I do way worse. Sometimes you just feel you have that synergy with a team and that’s your crew.

Man, I was getting this magma rock to melt ice and had to fight a tyrant boss enemy, but there were all these fire elementals around the area, one of which was a tyrant boss itself, and every time I would fight this enemy all the elementals would jump in and kill me. After trying and dying a few times I decided to pick off the elementals one by one, and almost won, but then Sharla kept going in the lava and killing herself. I was so frustrated as I had spent like an hour trying to get past this part and it’s not that I am under leveled. It was just the circumstance of the lava so my teammates with poor AI would keep dying and having multiple tyrant boss jump into the fight at once...

The game popped up a message that said “Battles too hard? Turn on casual mode?” And I was like, ohhhh yaaaaah

Ya know what? I think I’ll take you up on that, thank you. Proceeded to beat every enemy in that room, and even then it felt like it took forever. I’m so glad they added casual mode to this game. It just got me past a section of frustration that very well might have put me off from continuing to play. Because each attempt just took so long to get there, fighting enemies along the way, and then it took so long trying to pick off the enemies one by one without dying, and I could spend 20 minutes and then die and have to do it all over again for the fourth time. What a great addition.

@JaxonH i do the same, only shulk, reyn and sharla.

I recall that magma boss too. I just barely beat it with my party dead expect me, and very little hp.. then those floaters came by and tried ganging up on me. I quickly bolted and after they stopped, I went back for the treasure. I highly recommend saving right before a boss battle or often. You can quickly load that save so you dont have to trek all the way back from an auto save.. I havent needed to use casual mode yet but im not opposed to it when I get stuck. Especially with a 70 hour game. 4 chances on a boss and if not, casual mode will be put to use.

@Tyranexx No, you'll want cold weather equipment for the area you go to after Prison Island. Which is where I left off when the Pokemon DLC came out and granted several long standing wishes I had for the series and was basically my entire weekend's free time. lol

@NintendoByNature
That’s a good idea, actually.

I do hope Casual Mode stays for future entries though. It seems like they really perfected and addressed all the issues with XC2. The waypoints, side quest navigation, the map, the tutorials, the fast travel, getting in and out of menus quickly, even going above and beyond with expert and casual modes, with no penalty for using them temporarily.

@JaxonH Yea for sure. It's saved me alot of frustration. Not sure i want to jump off that cliff? Save right before I do and see if it was worth it lol.

I've only struggled with a handful of bosses and that quick save, saved the game for me. Because of it I've never felt like the game has wasted my time. Same with fast travel and so on. It's something to be said about what they've done with the game. A 70 hour game that doesn't waste your time.

The only time I felt annoyed was eryth sea traversing, even with the portals.

He's a good character(if you know how to use him), but making a party that works well with him is tricky. I tried multiple times in the original Wii version, but I couldn't make him click for some reason.

The last quarter of the game is undeniably the worst part of it. It continues much longer than it needs to. You might assume that once you've got to the "final area" of the game (as in the last new place that you've yet to explore), then that's more or less the end. But........NOPE. There's like another 10 hours or something from that point, and the story gets far more convoluted than it was for the first 75%.

Still, the end cutscene is great. So that's a silver lining.

Yeah, I understand it from a story perspective, going from the beautiful nature to an industrial place let's say, but it definitely wasn't enjoyable to me since a big part of the enjoyment was finding out new beautiful areas.

Yeah the story is so heavily based on that "epic journey across massive world" idea, that it just feels a bit confused and lost once that runs out of fuel.

They should've basically ended the story within a couple of hours of reaching the Mechonis capital. That would've been best.

@Dezzy I feel like once the party enters Mechonis, the cutscene aspect of the game begins to thin. In Mechonis Field there are only four or five cutscenes because the whole area is traversed with a bunch of story missions.

@theJGG

I'm about to get to that area now!

I genuinely don't remember anything story-related inside Mechonis, until you get to the head (I assume the capital is meant to be in the head, although I don't think it explicitly says that)

@Dezzy There is one mini-arc that is revealed at the end of Mechonis Field, and after that you meet Vanea, (keeping it vague for potential first comers) but otherwise that's it storywise until Agniratha